Labor has dragged Australia into the US-Israel war on Iran. We must stop them

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced Australia will provide military support for the latest illegal United States-Israel war on Iran.

Since initiating their joint war on February 28, the US and Israel have committed the crime of launching a war of aggression, attacking civilian populations and assassinating political and military leaders of a sovereign nation, among others.

Despite this, Albanese said on March 10 that the Labor government was sending military assistance — including 85 military personnel, an E-7A Wedgetail aircraft and medium-range air-to-air missiles — to Gulf states for “collective self-defence” against Iranian missile and drone attacks.

It follows similar actions by Britain, which has deployed RAF fighter jets for similar operations in Jordan, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.

These actions threaten to further escalate a war that has already begun to spill over into a broader regional conflict: while Israel has again carried out military strikes in southern Lebanon, killing hundreds, Turkey claims NATO air defences brought down an Iranian ballistic missile over its territory on March 9.

From the start, the Socialist Alliance has condemned the US-Israel war on Iran and called on Labor to immediately reverse its support for this dangerous new war drive.

The US-Israel war drive is not new; it follows their 12-day joint military assault on Iran in June last year and comes on the back of decades of US-led economic warfare, crippling sanctions, covert intelligence operations and military attacks — all of which have only made life harder for Iranians.

Socialist Alliance supports the Iranian people’s struggles for democracy and against oppression. But we know US and Israeli bombs will not assist these struggles; if anything, they do the opposite.

Trump has claimed he is “liberating” Iran, as among his reasons. But just like the other justifications, this has no basis in truth.

For example, the US also claimed it needed to act in “self-defence” against impending Iranian strikes, despite Pentagon officials acknowledging they have zero intelligence for this.

Similarly, the US raised the need to eliminate Iran’s nuclear capabilities, despite Trump claiming this had been “completely and totally obliterated” in the June attacks.

In reality, as US Marxist Kevin Anderson argues, it is more likely that Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are “seizing upon what they consider to be a generational opportunity, with Iran’s theocratic dictatorship shaken by the January [Iranian] people’s uprising and available intel on the whereabouts of key leaders”.

Anderson explained that the January uprising was truly massive and “united two major strands of recent opposition”. These were “the more class-based and rural uprisings of 2017 and 2018–19 over economic grievances, and the giant 2022–23 ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ movement that united demands for the end of theocratic restrictions on women, with unrest in two regions inhabited by oppressed minorities, Kurdistan and Sistan and Baluchistan”.

Ultimately, the uprising was only contained through mass repression, with the Iranian regime killing at least 7000 people and arresting another 40,000.

Far from liberating the Iranian people, Trump instead appears to want a repeat of his successful strategy in Venezuela. Lebanese socialist Gilbert Achcar argues that this strategy seeks to “change the regime’s behaviour” rather than “changing the regime” itself.

According to Achcar: “The Trump administration is betting that overwhelming military pressure, combined with the elimination of several leaders — including the head of state — will tip the balance in favour of pragmatic, non-ideological ‘moderates’.”

He adds that Trump’s “primary objective is for the Iranian regime, with its core structures intact, to cooperate with the United States along the lines of Washington’s other regional allies … It fears the regime’s collapse, recognizing that such an outcome would likely lead to armed chaos and fragmentation, producing extreme instability in the Gulf region.”

Achcar notes that this strategy contrasts with Israel’s aims, which “favours such a collapse”, as it “aligns with the longstanding Zionist plan to fragment the entire Middle East”.

These are not the only lines of division that have emerged among Western states.

Several European governments have spoken out against the attacks. French President Emmanuel Macron on March 3 condemned the US-Israeli military strikes for being “carried out outside the framework of international law”. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has also been outspoken against the war’s illegality. Likewise, Swiss Defence Minister Martin Pfister said on March 8 the ⁠attack “constitutes a violation of international law”.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who initially backed the strikes, has since said his support was not a “blank cheque” for the US, with his defence minister now urging a ceasefire.

Yet the Australian government has remained steadfast in its support for the US-Israel war — not just by refusing to criticise it, but by actively assisting it.

Asked about the legality of the military strikes, foreign affairs minister Penny Wong said that was a “matter for Israel and the US”. However, when it came to Iran, Wong said she supported action “to prevent Iran from continuing to be a risk to global peace and security”.

An Australian government that was serious about global peace — as opposed to maintaining US-Israeli dominance in the Middle East region — would not be sending military assistance to prop up the US-Israel war.

It would demand an immediate end to the attacks on Iran.

It would also cut all military and intelligence ties with Israel and Israeli weapons’ manufacturers and impose sanctions on the Israeli state.

Finally, it would withdraw from the US-led AUKUS, ANZUS and Quad military alliances and sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

The first step to achieving a government with an independent foreign policy based on international solidarity, peace and justice is to build the protests against the US-Israel attacks, which represent a danger to the whole world.

[Federico Fuentes is a member of the Socialist Alliance National Executive.]